Medieval Drama and Theatre Rite and Theatre Rite

Medieval Drama and Theatre

Rite and Theatre Rite Repetitive (to make past events or myths present) Collective experience (everyone’s active participation) Sacred place and time

Rite and Theatre Rite Theatre Repetitive (to make past events or myths present) Independent from the chronological watersheds of a community Collective experience (everyone’s active participation) Sacred place and time Audience – Actors Stage: the space of playing Acting - Impersonation

The Dramatic Core of Christian Liturgy - Matins of Easter Sunday - The „Quem queritis” trope - Trope - Melisma - Sequence

The „Quem queritis” trope „Quem queritis? ” = „Whom are you looking for? ” (Mk 16) Angel: “Quem queritis in sepulchro, O Christicolae? ” Marys: “Ihesum Nazarenum. ” Angel: “Non est hic. Surrexit sicut praedixerat. Ite, nuntiate quia surrexit a mortuis. ”

Whom are you seeking…? Angel: “Whom are you seeking in the sepulchre, O Christians? ” Marys: “Jesus of Nazareth. ” Angel: “He is not here. He rose as he predicted. Go, announce that He has arisen from the dead. ” Everyone: “Alleluia. The Lord has risen. ” Angel: “Come and see the place. ”

The Regularis Concordia - 10 th-century Benedictine reform - Winchester Trope

From Rite to Theatre - Early outdoor liturgical plays - Drive in the Church to make religion and faith visible: - 1215: Lateran IV - Mendicant orders - 1265: Institution of the Feast of Corpus Christi

Liturgical Plays - Liturgy-bound (fix part of the liturgy) - Latin - Bound to dialogical tropes that appear in the text of the liturgy - Sung - Gestures dominate over words - Monastic origin - Mostly indoor plays - Remains in practice all throughout the Middle Ages

Giotto di Bondone: Crib at Greccio

Stage Performances - Not bound to liturgy Mainly vernacular Theme: Salvation history Performed Rhetorical and theatrical effects Initially ecclesiastical control Outdoor performances From the 13 th to the 16 th century

Survey of stage plays 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. What kind of plays? (Genre) Where and how? (Staging and performance) Who played? (Actors) Who watched? (Audience) Who composed? (Playwrights) Who interprets? (Reception and the modern reader)

Genres 1 - Ludus / play Interludium Rapraesentatio / representation Processio / procession Royal entry – tableaux vivants Pageant

Genres 2 - Mystery plays - Cycles (York, Wakefield / Towneley, Chester, N-Town /East Anglia/) - Fragments or solitary plays - Miracle plays - Morality plays (Psychomachia)

Stationary: - Round theatre - Single scaffold Staging

The Martyrdom of St Apollonia

Staging 2: The Pageants

Pageant Wagons

Staging 3: Indoor Performances - Aristocratic households - The Moral Play of Wisdom (? ) - Colleges: Student performances - Priories and monasteries - Commissions by the royal court

Actors and Players - No professional players - Clergy and guilds - Minstrels - Dancers and musicians

Audience: Entertainment and Devotion

Playwrights - Almost all anonymous - The York Realist - The Wakefield Master - John Lydgate

Mysteries’ End

Peak and Ban of the Plays - Paradox: Peak of mysteries coincides with the spread of private devotion - Mysteries continue into the 16 th c. - From dogma to civic pride - Reformation: Ban on the plays

Medieval Theatre Websites • http: //www. umm. maine. edu/faculty/necastr o/drama • http: //www. yorkmysteryplays. org/index_hig hres. htm